Toronto FC is close to landing Brazilian striker Gilberto, in what would be their first big off-season signing.

Since the team’s inception, Brazil has been Toronto FC’s Shangri-La — the place where imaginary stars come from.

Their first manager, Mo Johnston, claimed to have spent so much time there, he ought to have been made a landed immigrant. Neither he nor any of his successors ever managed to come out of the Amazon with a completed contract.

That could be changing within days. The team is close to signing their first potential superstar from the sentimental home of world soccer.

The first and more expensive will become the club’s face and focus. The second slot was being saved for a player who isn’t yet a global brand, the sort of player who makes his name in Major League Soccer rather than bringing it along with him. Gilberto is the latter sort of player.

A stroll through YouTube shows him as exactly the sort of speedy, ruthless finisher that thrives in MLS. He is also thickly built, which helps in a league that prizes physicality over artistry.

If it comes off — and deals out of South America are always fraught, as last year’s failed chase for Uruguyan Diego Forlan proved — Gilberto represents a new genus in MLS. He is one of the first youngsters who will choose North America over more glittering European options.

It’s understood that the Brazilian has been pursued by franchises in La Liga, Serie A and — most fervently — the Bundesliga. In order to get him, Toronto FC would have to outbid some very big clubs.

Other names that slipped in and out of the sights for that second slot include Bologna’s Rolando Bianchi and Celtic’s Georgios Samaras. Either would be an impact player in MLS, but neither is young. Throughout, the focus has been on identifying and procuring someone whose best years are ahead of him.

The option for the top-end name remains a list of one — Tottenham’s Jermain Defoe. There is a still a chance that Genoa’s Alberto Gilardino slips into that spot, but only if the ongoing effort to sign the English star falls through. Chelsea’s itinerant star Samuel Eto’o was also a possibility, but didn’t meet the hoped-for combo of enthusiastic brand salesman as well as goal scorer.

At this point, it is no longer a function of convincing Defoe to come. The player wants to be in Toronto, and is apparently willing to come at the start of the MLS season in March, rather than after Brazil 2014. This would be a remarkable profession of faith, since it theoretically puts his spot on England’s World Cup team in peril. As part of the wooing process, Toronto FC has reached out to England manager Roy Hodgson trying to acquire an assurance that playing in MLS will not jeopardize Defoe’s chances of making the team.

Hodgson has sensibly replied that he would rather see Defoe playing regularly in Canada than sitting on the bench in England, which is where the out-of-favour player is nailed right now.

The final hurdle between Defoe and Toronto FC is finalizing an agreement-in-principle with Spurs before the free-for-all of the January transfer window. Those negotiations are thought to be headed in a positive direction.

Two genuine threats. That’s all it takes in this league. If they manage to pull off these two signings, Toronto FC goes from a bottom feeder to a team in the top third. It will represent an enormous outlay of cash — likely north of $50 million in total. That’s roughly 20 times the MLS salary cap.

Other, smaller deals are nearing completion to round out the squad with two or three low-cost veterans from within MLS. One of those could be Canadian stalwart and former TFC captain Dwayne De Rosario.

Given the way De Rosario was pushed out of his hometown after sundown, his arrival alone would lend heavily to the narrative of a fresh way of doing things at TFC under new GM Tim Bezbatchenko. No one person can say more about that change without saying anything than the best domestic player Canada has ever produced.

None of this has come off yet. Nothing in this league can ever be considered done until there’s a guy on a podium in a jersey. But it’s getting closer to reality than it has ever been.

After years of hoping they might manage to change the soccer temperature in this town, Toronto FC has at least finally managed to find the oven.

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